GA 075 | The Lean Frontiers Mission with Jim Huntzinger and Dwayne Butcher

You're listening to episode 75 with Jim Huntinger and Duane Butcher.

Welcome to the Gemba Academy Podcast, the show that's focused on helping individuals and companies achieve breakthrough results using the same continuous improvement principles leveraged by companies such as Toyota Del Monte and the U.S. department of Defense. And now, here's your host, Ron Pereira.

Hey there. This is Ron Pereira with Gemba Academy, and I'd like to welcome you to another edition of the Gemba Academy Podcast. As always, thank you for taking time out of your day and your week to listen to the show and for watching our Lean and Six Sigma training videos. We definitely appreciate each and every one of you. Now then, today I'm excited to welcome Jim Hunsinger and Dwayne Butcher to the show. Now, longtime Lean thinkers have probably heard of Jim and Duane, and if you haven't heard of them, you've probably heard of Lean Frontiers, especially if you're into the. The kind of the Lean Thinking conference scene. Jim and Duane actually lead an organization called Lean Frontiers, and we're gonna get into what they do and how that organizations work during the show. But they actually, they head up these conferences, these Lean Frontiers conferences, and they're niche conferences and we're going to explain that. So there's some conferences are focused on Lean Accounting, some on Lean hr, so forth. So we're gonna get all into that. But what I wanna do here just quickly in the intro is just to tell you about the conferences that are coming up that Jim and Duane are associated with, as well as the AME conference. So, and we're gonna touch on each of these conferences a bit more during the show. But the first one is October 5th through the 6th is the summit on Lean Leadership. And that's gonna be in Jacksonville, Florida. And then the next one that same week, also in Jacksonville, Florida is the Lean Accounting and Lean Management Summit. And that's gonna be October 8th through the 9th. Now, a few weeks after that is going to be the AME Conference. And Jim and Duane will be at that conference, but they're not technically associated with AME. That's not a Lean Frontiers conference. It's AME run conference. Obviously that's going to be October 19th to the 23rd in Cincinnati, Ohio. Now, I'm personally going to be at all of these conferences and most of the Gemba Academy team will be at the AME Conference and we're going to have video cameras and whatnot at all of the conferences, capturing some good footage and whatnot. So that's going to be fun. And I will say that we have partnered with both Lean Frontiers and AME Gemba Academy has in order to save all of our listeners 10% on the admission to any of these conferences. So if you're interested in going to any of them and you want to save 10%, simply go to gembapodcast.com 75 and that's 7. 5 for 75. So gembapodcast.com 75and you're going to find the coupon codes and links to register for any of these conferences. Now again, we're big fans of going to conferences. We think that's an awesome way to network and to listen to some really strong presenters and so forth. So GembaPodcast.com 75 learn how to save 10%. And that's all I want to say at this point. I just want to jump right into the show and get on with Jim and Dwayne. So enough for me. Let's get to the show. All right, Jim and Duane, thank you so much for coming onto the show. Where are you guys calling in from today?

They're calling from Indianapolis, Indiana, north side.

Yeah, it's great to be here.

All right, great to have you guys on. Home of the Colts. You guys getting ready for the football season to start?

Yeah, I guess it's what, maybe a little more than a week away.

Yeah, well, when we're recording this, it will be. So I guess by the time they listen to it, maybe we've already been playing, but yeah.

And the Colts won.

Yeah. Hopefully I'm a big Colts fan too as well, so. Yeah. All right. Well, guys, I appreciate you coming on. We're going to jump into lean frontiers and what you guys do and all that. But as you know, we like to start all of our shows with our guests kind of sharing a quotation that inspires them. So do you guys have one that you'd like to share?

Yeah, I do. And actually it's more than one.

Okay.

So yeah, a couple things is thinking through that reminded me of actually and I usually because I like to go through and. And study history is the things to learn from history. And one is actually from a couple guys by Homer Sorensen and Charles Pratzman who actually were involved in the post war occupation of Japan and rebuilding of Japan. And a lot of what we would call today is Japanese management was actually deployed by the United States and Japan during that. But in actually a, a training course they put together for executive management during that time of rebuilding Japan's industry is a quote out of something that they did or wrote in the manual was this, we cannot depend on a law or a rule that says that we must have teamwork or cooperation. People must want to work together and must realize that by working together, they also have the chance of reaching their own individual objectives. So the reason I like that is we think a lot of these things are new and are in the last 20 years or so. But actually, I think that's very insightful that actually the development of good teamwork and a good organization is actually the development of individuals and allowing those individuals to thrive as individuals and come into being in working together. Which also relates, interestingly enough, to the TWI program that was developed during the war. And a quote out of actually, the job instruction manual from 1943 says, Today a company cannot afford the extravagance of managers who are not good teachers. So the reason that's so important is because that's really what it's about. And that's something that actually came up in the first number of years of or last few years about learning about lean. And lean culture is really not so much managers or leaders, but they have to be teachers first. And that also reminds me of the hall of Fame coach, John Wooden, who had, I think, 10 national championships with UCLA. He never saw himself as a coach. He always saw himself as a teacher. So anyway, I look at all that is really, ultimately that. That's the combination of the two. Not only is that how you develop continuous improvement through that, but that's actually how you develop and utilize good leadership.

Yeah, I love it. It's all about people, right? Yes. All right. Well, very good. Well, guys, let's just jump right into it and tell us about Lean Frontiers. What do you guys do?

Well, I think the.

And go ahead and say who you are and all that so people can kind of get your bearings on your voices. Jim and Duane.

So this is Dwayne. And when we explain who Lean Frontiers is, we really start with the premise that Lean is a business model. You know, you hear the debates of, is Lean a set of tools?

Is it?

So we look at Lean as a business model. So what that means then is if Lean is a business model, it only makes sense that the entire business must understand what Lean is and what their role is in supporting that. So when I say the entire business, I mean the accounting function, the human resources function, sales and marketing, the research and development, product development people. If this is a business model, everyone needs to understand what that model is and their unique role in supporting that model. So what we've done over the years is we've created learning communities, I guess, if you will, around each of those vertical silos or functional business units. So for instance, the Lean Accounting Summit, which is now going into its 11th year, the Lean Accounting Summit gathers together the accountants to help them understand what their role is in measuring the lean enterprise and what their role can be in motivating lean behaviors.

Yeah, really? I'll say that it's kind of in tandem, not only what they need to do as far as lean accounting specifically for the organization, but also how does lean accounting and their role fit in the accounting function and in the enterprise as a whole? How do they integrate with all the other silos that they're engaged with in some form or another?

What if you're not an accountant? Should you still go?

So for the Lena County Summit specifically, yes. And that has been the case over the past. We really, in the early days made a strong push to get the accounting and operations folks there at the same time.

Yes.

And saw some great progress along those lines.

Yeah. So I mean, both of them learned from it. One, obviously the accountants learned, you know, what is lean accounting? What are some of the tools, how to apply those, how do those function in the organization? The other side of it is the operational people. They also learn, well, what is the accountant's role in the lean enterprise? How does that interact with me and my functions, whether again, whether it be operations or other silos. So the mutual understanding is important to how do the different functions integrate with each other.

Yes, yes.

And we were just talking earlier, actually we've seen progress by getting these learning communities together of like minded people, accountants or HR professionals. We see over the years, you know, progress being taking place where, you know, the first Lien Accounting Summit, the accounting, the accountant was coming in and saying, hey, I'm here because my operations people have been beating me up and saying that I'm wrong and I don't get what they're trying to do. I'm here to prove them they're wrong. So they went from that mentality to literally, I'd say four to five years in, the accountants were coming up to us and saying, you know what? I am now the driver of lean transformation in our organization. For us, that's so rewarding to see that transformation of thinking and that's what we're trying to accomplish, to help the human resources person to have that same aha moment where they realize the impact that they can have in their sphere of influence.

Yes. What other communities do you guys have besides accounting?

So really we touch most every functional business unit you can think of. So sales and marketing and product development, Human resources. Human resources, supply chain logistics, and also.

Some things that are somewhat horizontal in their function and impact, like TWI training within industries. And certainly human resources has a horizontal type of function as well. And also Kata, we have a KATA summit.

Now, one thing that I told you, I'm going to keep you guys on your toes and throw a few other questions we haven't even talked about yet. But one thing that I'm curious, you guys have been around for quite a while. You, you've experienced a lot with Lean and you've been part of this community for, gosh, a long, long time. I want you to imagine that you are on that first research team traveling around the world with James Womack and these guys and your. Just before the machine had changed the world. Right. It's all the research that went into that. And let's say that you were sitting around one night and you were kind of talking about what should we call this thing that we're learning? What would you guys have said if you had been part of that research group? What would you have called it? We call it Lean. But what would you have called it?

Oh, gosh, that's. I guess it's somewhat difficult to answer off the top of my head. I don't know.

Or do you think it's well named? I guess maybe. Let me start there.

I guess I don't know if it's well named. I think it's reasonably named. Maybe that's one way to take. I think it's reasonably named. But I got to think if we would have been there too, probably would have came out, even though it might have been different than Lean. Probably would have been some story similar to that, that it kind of happened on somewhat of a obscure whim or just kind of casual conversation is where the name kind of came from, where they said, well, I don't know. That makes as much sense as anything. Let's run with that. I got to think something similar would have probably came out of it.

Yeah.

And probably just generally more focused on. I'm sure they're more focused on a task of, you know, the discovery and capturing the data and articulating the data. So I think it probably would have been somewhat more of an afterthought of what it might have been. Even though like, like the name that actually is there. Lean kind of cat caught on and kind of continues to run to this day.

Well, what's interesting about what you Guys are doing is, you know, for the longest time with Lean manufacturing. Right. And, and still is. A lot of people talk about lean manufacturing, but it does put it in this box that, you know, some people would say, well, it doesn't apply to me then I'm not in manufacturing. Which is obviously nonsense. So I think you guys have done a great job of opening people's minds and, you know, eyes to the fact that Lean is, like you said, a business system. It's a way of thinking and working and it applies to anybody.

Yeah, certainly, yeah. Business model. And sometimes some people I know, particularly Ori Humey, will say this. It's a, it's a business strategy. So entire way you think about and operate your business.

Yes, yes. Love it. All right, so you guys were telling me a story of a well known Lean leader who actually challenged you guys one time saying that, you know, maybe that you guys were kind of perpetuating a silo mentality by creating these communities around these, you know, functional silos, if you will. How did you respond to that?

Yeah, so I don't know if I can mention Karen Martin by name, but yeah, she's the one that challenged us on that. And it's a very fair point. You know, at all of our events in the past few years, we've had a display of glass cylinders or tubes. I love it that we're asking people to vote which business unit in your company most needs to understand Lean. And so people can vote by dropping a ball in accounting or in hr, sales and marketing. So it very visually demonstrated the silos of an organization. But at the same time we talk about how we must shatter silo thinking. And so Karen, in her typical Karen Moe challenged us with the silo thinking is a problem in the Lean enterprise. Aren't you guys perpetuating that? I guess the short answer is yeah, maybe. The long answer is we know that we've got to move beyond that silo thinking. So our whole approach has been simply here in the beginning to get people within each of these silos, if you will, to understand what Lean is and that they have some role in that. Now once we've got that enlightenment and those, those aha moments that I said earlier, then we can begin to do what our long term strategy is and help them understand what it means to work across silos to, you know, as, as value is flowed throughout the organization. So you look at the silos as a very vertical, very vertical orientation. Our long term objective is more of a horizontal orientation.

Yeah. And certainly people within an Organization need to be very effective within their silos. So obviously the accountants need to be very effective. Accountants in this case understand lean accounting, understanding lean practices engineers need to be very good at engineering, Sales and marketing need to be very good at sales and marketing. Of course, obviously from the lean perspective, they need to be effective at that. So that's why even though it appears we're doing the silo thing, part of it is, yeah, we are, because people need to be good in those areas. And as Dwayne said and explained in detail, but with also looking at the bigger picture of how do each one of those silos integrate with the other silos from a business enterprise standpoint? From an effective lean enterprise standpoint.

Yeah.

And like you said, the Lean Accounting Summit, you have operations folks and accounting folks.

Yes.

Yeah, fantastic.

Yeah. And actually to stretch that even further, some of the best received presentations at the Lean Accounting Summit have been culture based. And Mike Hoseas, who talks very much from an HR standpoint, very, very well received. So that gets into kind of that long term thinking is that yeah, you're in this accounting function, but you've got other areas of the company that you're working in concert with.

All right, so we want everybody working together, kind of flowing together as one unit. It's the long term solution or long term goal. But where do you guys see the communities right now? What the gaps and what are your next big opportunities?

Yeah, I'd say it depends on which one of the communities you're talking about. Some are certainly probably a little more mature than others. Again, for example, lean accounting, this being the 11th year, there's certainly been more work done in that area than others. Some of the up and coming ones are probably like human resources. Human resources being more engaged and involved. Of course, operation work has been around for a while. Sales and marketing is one. There's probably a lot of work to do in. There's been a little bit of work done, but a lot more needs to be done in that area. And we certainly get feedback that certain areas like that, they say not only do their sales and marketing, not necessarily know what to do from a lean enterprise standpoint. A lot of people that may be very astute in lean accounting or other operations go, I'm not even quite sure what to do, what to tell them from that standpoint. So it really varies community to community. And again, that's one of our objective is how do we help all these communities rise up to a higher level. Again, even in a silo, in a particular field standpoint, as well as with the lean enterprise. So that's an ongoing piece of work that we continually to work towards the objective of rising all of them.

Yeah. And I know one of the things that I've heard Jim talk about quite a bit in the past is the untapped potential that exists in product development. And he's specifically had some experience in product development, working with operations.

Process development.

Yeah, process development.

So, yeah, that's probably even in a lean community. That's probably the. I wouldn't say probably that is the biggest untapped actually financial reward is developing a lean product development and process. Lean process development and developing them in conjunction and then delivering into obviously an executable operation and all that. So that's one that needs a lot of work and we putting some attention towards that, particularly going forward in the future.

Mm. So one question I do have is like, when you talk about like the sales and marketing community, for lack of a better word, when you say that it needs more work, what do you mean? Like that there aren't enough people within that community thinking about lean or. Tell me more about that because I'm curious.

Yeah, certainly. Yes to that is just the basic question we get from a lot of people, whether they're sales and marketing people or other people, is, is what is sales and marketing's role in a lean enterprise? What are the practices and behaviors that they need to be doing in order to be not only successful from a sales and marketing standpoint, but also help with the success of the other functional areas of the business enterprise? How do they interact with operations, how do they interact with accounting and so forth. So that one's just one because there's just been actually so little work overall and very few organizations that have spent a lot of time thinking and applying in that area. There's just not a lot of examples out there to show people. But there are some and there are certainly a few people that are doing some good work in that area.

Yeah. For comparative purposes, you look at the very first lean Accounting Summit back in 2005, when we held a thought leaders meeting. The day before the summit began, we had what, 20, 25 people there that had done research, that had done writing. There were several books out at that point. So there was this body of thought leaders who were helping drive the thinking forward in the sales and marketing space. Maybe on one hand I could count the number of people that are deep thinkers in that sales and marketing space. And then again with the Lena county community, we had 300 and so people at that first Summit where if we were to try to pull off a sales and marketing summit, there's just not that critical mass of people and companies who are yet thinking along those lines. So when we say that there's work yet to be done, that's what we mean by that. And just one of the ways that we've addressed that, because we're known mostly for our, you know, the large events that we do, but because sales and marketing is not yet in a place to pull off a large event, you know, we'll do things like smaller workshops that we've done with. Joe Dagger is one of the. One of the names in that space.

Or sessions at some of our summits, like Lean Accounting, where we will have a session on, you know, lean sales and marketing, just, again, just to work on getting the body of knowledge that is out there out with the intent of, hopefully over time, people will begin developing that.

Yeah, I love it. Yeah. We spend a lot of time here at Gemba Academy talking about, you know, we have sales departments and all the rest of it. And Steve Cain and myself were having a conversation the other day and talking about, you know, the difference between a salesperson trying to convince someone to buy versus helping that person identify problems that they have then that your product then can meet. And so it's like a, you know, these are some lean thinking principles about how do you increase value for your potential customer and then sell your solution. Right. Or help them identify those problems. And so I'm really interested in this space myself, just because, gosh, we're a company trying to sell a product as well, just like you guys are.

Ron, keep pushing the boundaries in that area, and we'll have you as the first keynote speaker of the Lean Sales and Marketing Summit.

Yeah, well, we don't pretend to have it all figured out, but, gosh, we're so trying to find ways to practice what we preach because it's, you know.

That'S actually a common something we hear a lot in each of these communities. You look at the lean accounting community, specifically, when we first started it, people said, what do I know about Lean Accounting? We've only been doing this for a year. And Jim's pat response was, guess what? You've been doing it a year longer than everyone else out.

Yes, yes.

So if Gemba Academy's been working in this area for even a few days.

Or months, you're probably a pioneer.

You're keynoteworthy.

All right, well, we'll keep trying and maybe we'll meet up. All right, well, guys, what else do you guys hope to accomplish with your communities as you grow over the next, say, five, ten years?

Yeah, well, since lean is still, I guess, kind of a niche topic even in business and industry, it's still somewhat of a niche community overall. And we certainly really feel it shouldn't be. It really should be mainstream. It should be the baseline people are practicing and striving for. So that's one thing we're trying to do again, as an organization is how do we help the lean community not only grow, but also grow into being the mainstream thinking, the mainstream practice of certainly organizations and business and industry in the United States, but for that matter, even beyond that, which is, you know, we do have a lot of international people that attend our summits as well. But we really want to make this, this is the mainstream business model, behavior thinking, business strategy that all organizations are using. So that's certainly one of the things we're looking towards in the. For the long term is, you know, how do we, how do we help the community accomplish that?

And for those of us in the lean community, we, you know, we get that right. We, we understand the untapped potential that lean brings to not only an individual, but what the untapped potential that lean can bring to a company. And then you begin to multiply those companies who are practicing lean and what that means to a community, and you multiply communities who are practicing lean. What does that mean to a country? To some degree, it's very, and we've got a very missional approach to this, that the potential that lean thinking provides humanity. The surface has not even been scratched yet.

Tying it into. I'll tend to call the lean business model a micro model. Micro model in this case is a business model, but obviously the most powerful one that we know as of today, Lean business model, but also looking into what does that mean from macro models or economic models. How do you understand an economic model? How do you understand a business model? And how do those two interrelate and interact with each other? What Dwayne was saying is, so how do you drive this up to even a higher level? Not just what individual organizations are doing and doing good things, but how do you drive this up to the overall economic of a society and really driving the society to be more fluent, more abundant, more productive society.

Yes.

So those are some of the other things we are working on and looking towards in the future.

And we've tried to introduce that by bringing some entities that are not in the lean community, trying to bring them into the lean community. We've Worked with some folks on Wall street and had them presenting at the Lean Accounting Summit. Those that truly get lean and the value that it's, that it promises. Wall street is such a mess and causes lean companies to not think Lean.

Right, Exactly.

Wall street drives them to this immediate reaction in a company. But there's this longer term thinking that's needed in Lean. So anyway, we tried to incorporate some folks from Wall street and Jim, even more recently has been spending good deal of time with some, an economist and helping that person to understand those larger impacts.

Yeah. So yeah, I have a couple economists that have been having some discussion with in this regard to again, what does that mean? What does that mean for the macro model and the micro model and interrelationship, but also too, to get them on board, to get them ultimately part of the Lean community, to help drive this all forward, forwarded to a higher level.

And you think about that for a second. What if you had people on Wall street who understood Lean, supported Lean, talked Lean. You've got economists doing the same thing. You've got political pundits, you've got business writers. If you had that critical mass in the mainstream who understood this thing that we all know so well, what would that mean for a business community and for nations? For the world at large.

Yeah, for the world. Yeah.

Becomes very, very powerful.

Yeah, yeah. It's much bigger than producing widgets. Right. On an assembly line.

Exactly.

Yeah.

And it's exciting to us because I think most people in the Lean community get that even to the point where we've. I don't know if we, I don't think we coined this, but we've been using the lean for good type terminology. We've even had some conversations with GIMB Academy's Kevin Meyer along those lines, that there's just so much potential for humanity if this could be embraced as not just systems on a shop floor, but system wide.

Yep, exactly. Guys, the last question I have for you in this section, it's more of a tactical question, kind of a conference type question, but I'm curious, what advice do you have for. Let's say there's a manager of people listening right now and they're thinking of sending some folks to one of your conferences or just to any conference in general. What advice do you have for them to help them ensure their folks maximize their time at the conference? I mean, are there best practices of how to attend a conference?

I'd say from a general rule, be deliberate about it, go there with objectives in mind and certainly develop those as A team or group, depending on who you're looking at sending before you go there. So just like any, I guess, project or even business objective or business, you want to put in objectives in place that you want to hit and want to accomplish, and so go there very deliberately, get the information and certainly go back and go through some reflection and sharing upon your return. So essentially, I guess what I'm probably saying is practice, plan, do check, act.

Yes.

Deliberate in your efforts and attendance to a summit. And we actually know some organizations that do do that, and they do say they get a lot more. More out of it. Not only get a lot more out of it, but also tend to get a little better sticking power from it from when they return from it from the event.

There's an organization that had been to the TWI Summit several times, and believe it or not, we did not coach them in putting this presentation together. But as they recounted their Lean journey in their presentation, they had milestones that said this was the 2007 TWI summit, and here's what happened because of that.

Wow.

Here's the 2008 TWI summit, and here's what happened because of that. So again, for a couple guys in a small company trying to really impart lasting change in the company, something like that is just so rewarding to hear.

Oh, yeah.

But that's a company that really got the value of what they can get at a conference.

And certainly we're putting the effort to be deliberate about it.

Yes.

And there's to some degree, you know, I do agree with Jim, you've got to have a strategy coming in and a plan and a purpose. But from my own perspective, sometimes it's just go. Whether you go to our conference, you go to Lei or Ame, or I'll be going to the Northeast Lean Conference that GBMP runs. I've never been to that. And I'll tell you what, Ron, I'm busier than all get out right now, but I know for a fact if I stop what I'm doing and I go to their conference, I'm going to walk away having learned something, having been inspired, having made some connections with folks that I could not have had sitting behind my desk, which is what I would have done if I didn't go to their conference. So to me, there's value in getting your butt out of the chair and.

Going, yeah, go to Gemba conference.

Exactly.

Go to the Gemba. I guess maybe some knowledge.

Yes, exactly. Love it. Love it. All right, well, guys, thank you for that. Let's go Ahead and transition now into what we call the reflection section. So the first question I have is we spend a lot of time within the lean community talking about, you know, kind of continuous improvement and respect for people, with continuous improvement being, you know, the tools, the things that we do. But respect for people sometimes is a bit harder to put your finger on exactly what that means. So I'm curious, what does respect for people mean to you?

I guess I'd say this respect for people, to me means really helping them to develop, to be the, you know, the old term, the best that they can be, whether it's through coaching or whether it's given through situations. But what can you do for them to develop as an individual in your organization, in your interactions with them? So to me, that's a critical thing behind the respect for people.

What's the best advice you've ever received?

Probably. And actually this goes actually back to. And I can't remember, it was a college professor I had, and I don't know why, but this really stuck with me. But always ask questions. You can always ask questions if you're not sure, or you can always ask questions. And actually an exercise he had us do as an assignment was actually pick some company organization and if there's something you want to ask him for, write him a letter and ask them. And we'll come back, obviously, as a class, and the assignment is go do that and then come back and give a report on what the result was. And he left it pretty wide open, gave a few basic parameters.

But just go ask, I'll interject mine, and that's, don't take yourself too seriously.

Okay, what do you mean by that exactly? I mean, it's simple statement, but it could be pretty profound.

It is, it is. And to some degree, it goes into leans, no blame environment. And that failure is okay, you know, you want to avoid catastrophic failure, but learn by doing. Get out there and start. Start experimenting and practicing. And you know what? You're going to fail, but you're going to learn from it. So that's part of what don't take myself too seriously means, is be open to fail.

Yes. Yeah. And go fast and try. I always tell my daughter, she plays soccer, and I just said, you know what, baby? I said, I don't care if you make a mistake, Just make it going fast, you know? All right. Do you guys have a personal productivity habit that others might benefit from?

I'd say for me, and it relates back to the other question, is question everything, even in particularly yourself. Just always Ask questions in what you're doing or what you're thinking or what you've tried. Again, that somewhat goes back to the plan. Do check. Act as you run through that cycle. I see that as a personal cycle of questioning yourself, questioning your thoughts, questioning your actions, and trying to answer those in order to run back through the cycle again.

So this is an interesting question for you guys because you interact with so many different practitioners, but is there something that surprised you this past year just as you've been interacting or practicing lean?

I'd say one thing is. Well, this continues on is how much you can learn from. And we just talked about this, how much you can learn from mistakes upon good reflection. So I think it's not just learning from your mistakes, but again, being deliberate, being very deliberate in your reflection upon what you've done and what errors. As Duane said, it doesn't mean a catastrophic. They can be really little tiny things. But there's always good value and gems from learning through that process.

Got it. So do you guys have a routine or ritual that you follow when things aren't going well and you need to recharge and refocus?

I'd say for me, it's just try to stay as calm as possible. And that kind of goes to what I just answered. And that'll help you to learn from your mistakes and help you have a little more deliberate reflection. So just try to stay calm. Generally, when something like that happens, the world isn't necessarily going to collapse. There may be issues and problems, but just stay calm and reflect on what the situation is.

And I don't know if this comes through wisdom or just time being on this planet, but in my younger days, I would ride that roller coaster of the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. And it seems the more I go along, the more I kind of ride in that middle layer and talk a little bit about what Jim was talking about. But it's not as good as it seems. It's not as bad as it seems. So just try to stay even. Keel is beneficial no matter what the circumstance.

Yeah. All right. So is there a knowledge or skill area that you guys feel you need to improve in order to become better, lean thinkers?

Yeah, I could answer that. Is not jumping to solutions. I mean, that's one that's been around for a long time, but it's, I guess, a skill that you certainly got to practice and be conscious of all the time. Because certainly me as an engineer that that's my nature, is to try to jump to solutions Is again, try to pull yourself back and not do that. And that's something I got to be conscious of all the time. And I'm certainly not always successful at it either.

Yes, yes.

I would add to that visual management is something I think that we could stand to improve on even more in our organization. And it's funny because if you come to our office, you know, we've got stuff everywhere, but we're beginning to learn more and more what's useful, what's not useful, how best something should be incorporated into our daily routines. But we got in there and we started practicing it. We started doing it. It's interesting. We tried working on visual management for really a couple years and not much was working. And all of a sudden, I'm not sure, honestly, I don't know what it was, but something happened about a year ago and it began to click. So I guess all the failures from the past were accumulating to some degree and we were learning what doesn't work. And we're finally honing in on what does work. But we just need to continue down that road.

That's probably. I think that's around the time I set you guys up with that free Gemba Academy subscription. So maybe.

Absolutely absolute.

Oh, gosh, I just mess it with you. All right, well, guys, I really enjoyed talking with you. I mentioned in the intro that people, if they want to attend the conferences, let's just run through them real fast. The Summit on lean leadership is October 5 through 6 in Jacksonville, Florida. And then a few days later, also in Jacksonville, Florida, the Lean Accounting and Lean Management Summit. That's also. It's October 8th through the 9th. And then a few weeks later, I think you guys are going to be there as well as the AME conference in Cincinnati, that's October 19th to the 23rd. So if anybody wants to attend any of these conferences, you guys have been kind enough to offer a 10% coupon code, if you will, for Gemba Academy listeners and customers. So go to gembapodcast.com 75. That's 7. 5, like the number 7 and 5. And all the information for how to. How to get that discount and get your tickets to go to these summits. And I'm going to be there. Kevin's going to be there, and I can't wait to see you guys again. And perhaps we can go have a cold beverage or something in the evening.

Yeah, absolutely. Looking forward to it.

Ron, thanks for. Thanks personally for all you do. And Kevin, and for Gemba Academy, thanks for your contributions. To the Lean community.

So the last thing I want you guys to answer is how can people connect with you? Website, social media, all that good stuff.

So the best thing to do would just be go to leanfrontiers.com there's a link up top for summits and that's how you're going to find the quickest access to each of the upcoming summits.

Yeah, and actually on some of the summit websites too, there's resources that are there as well. So not only coming to summit, but there's also some resources people can reference for learning that they can take away.

Yes. Fantastic. All right, guys, well, thanks again and I look forward to seeing you soon.

Thank you, Ron. We do as well.

Thanks.

Take care.

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